Telecommunications firm Vodafone Samoa has reinvested $8 million into its existing network in the last five months in order to meet rising customer demand.

The multimillion tala reinvestment was revealed in a statement issued on Thursday by the telecommunications company, which emphasised that the investment is in line with its vision to respond to the needs of those customers who chose the network as their preferred service provider.

“These developments build onto our vision which is towards our customers choosing us as a preferred brand by ensuring we meet and exceed your needs – innovative products and services, radically simple, affordable and accessible to all,” the statement says.

“For our group of network engineers, it has been a hectic five months as we develop, integrate and innovate across our network to adopt these leading-edge services into Samoa.

“Vodafone Samoa modernized state of the art Mobile Data core with the latest Next Generation technology enabling our mobile data network to expand with significantly increased capacity.  “We have paired this replacement core with the expansion of our site networks to encompass more LTE1800 spectrum which enables these sites to handle more customers at faster speeds without congestion.”

Users of Google, Facebook and Netflix in Samoa are set to be the main beneficiaries of the reinvestment by the company, says the statement.

“If you are using Google, Facebook and Netflix services then you may be surprised by our new high-speed content delivery service.  

“Vodafone is pleased to be one of the first Pacific operators to partner with these major content suppliers, enabling us to install localized content servers which provide for delay-free viewing and searching. 

“When you use Google, Facebook or Netflix with Vodafone the content is smooth and direct and faster.”

The firm, which is headquartered in Fiji and has subsidiaries in a number of Pacific states including Samoa, has also increased the capacity of its internet bandwidth.

“Our national backbone service which extends throughout Upolu and Savaii has increased in speed from ~33,000Mbps to ~45,000Mbps (45Gbps) of capacity. Whether you are in Apia, Lalomanu, Faleolo or Salelologa, our fibre reaches you!”

Vodafone Samoa also marked another milestone to advise that its mobile network is now fully 4G compliant with over 75 per cent of its mobile network connecting through its fibre optic backbone, which the company says guarantees remote customers “unbeatable speeds”.  

“With Vodafone whether you live in the city or in the village, you will receive world-class service and performance.

“Our mobile coverage has expanded to over 95 per cent of the population with Vodafone operating on 91 towers throughout Samoa. Vodafone operates the largest and fastest site network in Samoa.”

For home and small businesses, the company said it has introduced FTTH (Fibre To The Home) technology, which is a next-generation service providing affordable voice, data and video services to the client’s location.   

“FTTH will progressively replace our old copper network with next-generation fibre optic which operates at scalable speeds up to 1,000Mbps (1Gbps).   FTTH is the one-stop solution for all your needs – high-speed internet, Moana TV, and telephony.”

In terms of its international service, the company has doubled its link capacity on the Tui Samoa Undersea Fibre Optic Cable and repositioned its primary connection to Sydney, Australia.

“This expansion has enabled much faster internet traffic for our New Zealand and Australia bound traffic.  And to ‘double this double’, we also have a second undersea fibre optic cable.   Yes. Vodafone Samoa operates on two undersea fibre optic cables.

“We are the only Samoan operator to have two undersea fibre optic links operating on both the Tui Samoa Undersea Fibre Optic Cable to Sydney, Australia and the Hawaiki Undersea Fibre Optic Cable to Oregon, U.S.A.  

“By having two independent links, Vodafone offers all our customers with surety of full fallback protection and fast service restoral times, should one cable service be unavailable. This makes your business and connectivity much safer and reliable.”